BIG ANNOUNCEMENT! *and some itty bitty prizes*

Helloooooo, everybody! 
I'm so sorry I haven't been in here for a while. As per my last post, I've been... busy. Writing, learning, writing, revising, napping, writing, eating, writing. (Ok, that got old fast. Wow, nothing more depressing than seeing your life spelled out in gerunds.)

 Christmas happened and my own group of little lovelies were on hand to celebrate. This is our table topper. I wish I could have left it up all year, but it started to get a little dry by Jan 15th.

 Some mod podge and paper punch snowflakes and I finally escaped from the land of Pinterest fails.

 Of course, there were cookies. Lots of cookies.

As for writing, I've been immersed in another Austen Takes the South story.

Getting lost in history...

                                                    
Pausing to revel in Southern beauty and grandeur...
                                                
 And emerging to take a breath of Southern style...

(Oh, wait. Rupert Penry-Jones has come to pay us a visit!)
Can you guess which Austen story I'm working on now? Yes?

Well, before we go there, I need to tell you something very exciting. In October, Beth Adams of Howard Books contacted me, wanting to know if I was open to selling this self published series.

                                                 (This is me. A happy writer, pecking away at my keyboard and dropping books into Kindle land. Awwww....)


  As a contented little indie author, it certainly gave me pause. What would it mean to have a traditional house heading this project? What kind of changes would there be? Were there limits to my story lines now? It was a big decision and we talked it over thoroughly. I knew this series needed serious editorial help. I also have always known that self publishing on Kindle doesn't reach the majority of readers. Some authors have successfully sold print on demand books in large quantities, but my earnings in paper were modest. I also knew my paper books weren't as polished as they could be, but I wasn't sure how to make them better. I knew it could be done, but I just didn't have the knowledge, or the time to invest in learning how to make it happen.

  In the end, I realized that I wanted to partner with an editor who loved Austen and understood this series. After much thought and prayer, I felt sure that Beth and Howard Books would bring new life to my quirky little romances. I loved them and wanted the best for them... and I took a chance.

And has it been an amazing journey! In just a few months we've edited both Pride, Prejudice and Cheese Grits AND Emma, Mr. Knightley and Chili-Slaw Dogs. The second of the series had some holes in plot and character motivation that needed to be filled, and it was a blast to dive back into that story. Beth Adams has an amazing gift for seeing a story from several different directions. Her questions always set me thinking on ways to bring the characters into tighter focus. I loved the stories before, but I'm very proud of them now.

The new ebooks became available on Amazon on the 14th. So far, more than ten people have contacted me to say they love the new edition more than the original, saying the story truly shines now. I agree!

So, all of this is to announce that this series is now part of Simon and Schuster/ Howard Books! And to celebrate, we're going to have to give away prizes. Since Rupert Penry-Jones was not available as a rafflecopter prize, I've had to settle for Austen movies. I tried to buy several different editions because I KNOW there is that tiny disagreement between fans over the 1995 and the 2005 Pride and Prejudice movies. (I would tell you which one I love the most, but I don't want to start a food fight on my first day back on the blog.)
                                        
I WILL tell you that Persuasion is my next book in the series! Persuasion, Captain Wentworth and Cracklin' Cornbread has been a thrill and a half to write.

Here's a peek at the (brand new, of course, since I have my own copies) movies I'm giving away. There are four, so enter often! Tell your friends and family!
Or not. If you can keep the entries down, you might just win THEM ALL.

And the typewriter is not for sale. She's my lovely baby and comes with me to book signings. Also, she weighs approximately a hundred pounds and I would be poor if I tried to ship her anywhere.
The giveaway ends on the 27th. Good luck!


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tina Russo Radcliffe talks Indie publishing and her new romantic comedy, The Rosetti Curse! With free ebook giveaway!

Hello, everybody! Before we get to our blog guest today, let me just wander down memory lane for a moment. (Don't worry, I'm almost forty and memory lane is a lot shorter than it used to be.)

I love a romance.

afranco.com

 

I really do. I love the sweet blushes of new love, the high of knowing you're loved in return, the heartbreak of thinking all is lost, and the triumph of love conquering all.

afranco.com

Oh, swoon!! I could just read sweet romance ALL DAY.

 

Except... sometimes it starts to all sound the same. Sometimes we get a little bored with the cookie-cutter romances and wish we had something different. We can't live on vanilla cupcakes and chocolate chip cookies. Sometimes we need a little lemon granita. Maybe some cannoli. A few biscotti.

Maybe a big slice of tiramisu with an extra shot of espresso and some dark rum for good measure.

123rf.com

 

(Great. Now I need dessert. And not just any dessert. I need ITALIAN dessert! I need some biscotti! And espresso!!)

Anyway, my point is that Tina has written a romance that promises to be the tiramisu to the usual chocolate chip cookie. (Not that there's anything wrong with chocolate chip cookies. I make them all the time. But tiramisu is one of a kind and something you don't forget in a hurry. Do you remember the last chocolate chip cookie you had? Yeah, me either. And I'm sure I've eaten some in the last month, maybe even the last few weeks.)

 

So, that's my bloggy bit. Tina made it easy on me by having a blog post all written up so I'm just going to cut and paste it. Read on down... and then hop over to check out her new book. She's offered (so kindly!) to give out a free copy to anyone interested, so leave a comment and a way for her to contact you.

When I first heard murmurings of a Tina Indie book I was curious.... then I saw the cover and I perked up. And then I read the blurb and I did a little Jersey fist pump. I love me some tiramisu writing. Enjoy and thanks for stopping by!

Are We Having Fun Yet? By Tina Russo Radcliffe

Here’s a newsflash. Writing is work. I keep an Excel spread sheet for my fiction, just so I can monitor exactly how much work it is. There are 426 entries on the spread sheet. The first entry is 1996. The last entry is my fourth sale to Harlequin Love Inspired books. Last week!
426 entries over seventeen years is not all that impressive. It rounds out to about twenty-five per year and that’s two a month. But it is consistent. I consider myself a working writer. I write, I edit, and I ghostwrite.
My spread sheet doesn’t include my non-fiction writing jobs: editing gigs, writing real estate reports for an environmental engineer, blog posts (medical, educational, and B2B), some with bylines, and some without. I’ve typed out menus for restaurants, and done many other assorted writing grunt chores. At one point I was writing forty blog posts a month for pay. If it exists, and I can get paid for it I’ll do it.

So you get my point here. I’ll do pretty much anything within my moral code for a check.  I admire writers who say it’s fun. It’s never been fun for me. Writing is work. It’s my job.
Something magical happened when I began working on my first Indie project.
I had fun.
I’m just now trying to figure out why. I do know that one big difference was that I wrote for an audience of one.
Me.
I was no longer writing for the readers, or the writers or the editors, the reviewers, and the contest judges. This project was for me, so expectation disappeared. The only expectation was mine. There’s nothing wrong with expectation. In fact meeting reader expectation is necessary to be a commercially successful author. But for this one project everything fell away except the writing. I don’t know what will happen with future books.
I do know that I’ve learned something valuable and Mr. Vonnegut sums it up nicely:

“Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.” Kurt Vonnegut

Writing my romantic comedy, The Rosetti Curse was magical and freeing. The internal editor disappeared. Of course the book had a developmental editor, and two Beta readers, but I was the publisher. The moment I realized I was responsible for every single comma and em-dash, I did have a panic attack. But I got over it and subscribed to The Chicago Manual of Style online, then immediately hired a copy editor.
And while it was still work- hours and hours and hours of work- this story was different.

From designing the cover with my cover maven, Rogenna Brewer to typing ‘The End,’ this project was my vision.
     I became empowered.
    I became overwhelmed.
    I was learning, and I still have so much more learning to tackle that it terrifies me.

    But I was having fun!

     I also gained a new respect for my traditional publisher and editor and all the behind the scenes people who produce my Love Inspired books. BTW, traditional and independent publishing should be considered apples and oranges. Don’t compare the experiences.
     There’s a healthy thing that happens when you Indie publish. You’re competing against yourself. Challenging yourself to be the best you can be in a new publishing modality, as author and publisher and marketer. It’s exhilarating. And because the birthing period is shorter, gratification occurs faster.
      Indie publishing isn’t a quick fix for your writing woes. There are no guarantees of success, financial windfalls, peer recognition or fame. But there is a satisfaction and yes, fun. Maybe you should think about having fun too.

Tina Russo Radcliffe writes romantic comedy as Tina Russo and inspirational romance as Tina Radcliffe. From Western New York, she’s lived in Massachusetts, Alabama, Germany, Oklahoma, and Colorado. She now lives in a cave in Phoenix, Arizona and comes out for coffee and writing supplies. A former Specialist 4^th Class in the U.S .Army, Tina has been a registered nurse, a library cataloger, a pharmacy clerk and now writes full-time at home. You can reach her www.tinarusso.com or www.tinaradcliffe.com  Her first Indie release, The Rosetti Curse, is available on Amazon for Kindle this week right HERE!

 

(Hi there, it's me, your hostess with the mostess. I know you already saw the cover, but I'm putting it up again because it's so nice... and it's good to have it right above the blurb. So, don't blame Tina for being repetitive. It's all my fault!)

The Rosetti Curse  

A Romantic Comedy of Italian Proportions…
She may look good in black, but Tessa Rosetti is not testing the family curse again. Three generations of women buried the men they love and confirmed Tessa’s belief in the Rosetti Curse.

Los Angeles cop, Thomas Riley, arrives back home in Silver Ridge, Colorado, to settle his grandmother’s estate, but while he's there he stumbles into trouble in the night. If his suspicions are correct, someone's cooking up more than biscotti at the local cookie factory.

Together, Riley and Tessa renew their old bond and battle a curse that leads them on a journey of destiny to the love of a lifetime.

"The Sopranos Meets Fried Green Tomatoes. Loved this book!" Sharon Sala - author of GOING ONCE - Mira Books - October 201

If you’d like the opportunity to have a free Kindle copy of The Rosetti Curse, leave a comment and a way to contact you!